For years in the Dominican Repubilc, the custom has been to judge corrupt government people in the media and let them off in the Dominican justice. The civic group Participacion Ciudadana expresses concern this practice is continuing in the present administration. President Luis Abinader won the Presidency in 2020 campaigning that he would put an end to government corruption impunity.
The civic group Participación Ciudadana in a press release raises the alert that several major corruption cases have ended in the court with disappointing results for the fight against corruption. The watchdog organization is especially concerned that the prosecutors at the Attorney General Office under a new Attorney General did not make changes in the Omsa case and in the end, the weakly presented case resulted in major impunity for the persons that were charged in the media reports.
Participación Ciudadana reported on Tuesday, 13 September 2022 that Dominican society is fed up with corruption and impunity and that is why it had participated in marches for two years, why it voted the government out in 2020 and why it has set its eyes on the work of the Public Prosecutors Office and the courts to follow up on what happens in those instances.
In a press release, the civic movement comments that in spite of the collective effort, all the sentences released in the recent months have sown a deep confusion and the fear that impunity will continue to prevail in the country.
“Cases that occurred in front of the eyes of the nation and the world, some that occupied international investigations and received convictions in several countries; others whose evidence was public knowledge, that were supported by solid investigations of national journalism and that shook the conscience of citizens, now it turns out that the Dominican courts do not find anyone guilty, a few were given light sentences and the majority acquitted, remaining in mystery who committed the deeds,” states the organization.
Participación Ciudadana states:
“The cases to which we refer are, the Odebrecht case, the Tucano airplanes case, the Los Tres Brazos neighborhood case and, recently, the OMSA case. In the first two cases, the companies confessed to having paid bribes and were fined. In the case of the Tucanos, the bribery was proven and a fine was received, but in the Dominican courts, the people who received the bribes remained anonymous and protected by the cloak of impunity. The scandals produced by the Odebrecht business have dozens of people imprisoned in the continent, while in the Dominican Republic, where the bribery center operated and, according to confessions, more than US$92 million were given to obtain contracts, only two were convicted.
“In the case of Los Tres Brazos, a neighborhood that a private company was selling to its own inhabitants, no one was found guilty either.
“Recently, in the OMSA case, only the perpetrator of the horrible murder of lawyer Junior Ramirez was convicted as a homicide; no one was found to be an accomplice in a death that originated due to allegations of corruption. Nor was the court able to penalize those responsible for the corruption scheme that, according to multiple evidence presented publicly, operated in the OMSA. In the operative part and in the judges’ comments, the court admits that there was corruption, but sentences only the financial manager, Faustino Rosario Diaz, to a pyrrhic sentence of one year, for a minor charge of extortion. The others involved were acquitted.
“The lenient sentences and the declarations of innocence that have surprised the country in recent months, show how difficult it is to penalize corruption in the Dominican Republic and show that there is a lot of work to be done and a lot of will to be contributed if we wish to put an end to the impunity that has been established for decades in all the institutions called to prevent and sanction corruption.
“The cases mentioned have in common having been investigated and the files prepared during the administration of Jean Alain Rodríguez, characterized by the reign of impunity.
“The justice system is a whole that includes judges and prosecutors. The citizenry makes no difference if impunity is imposed because of a poorly conducted investigation by prosecutors, or because of a wrong or corrupt sentence by judges. The credibility of justice rests on all its actors and it has been widely demonstrated that it has a great influence on the growth of crime, corruption and violence levels. It is even a primordial element in social cohesion and in the vision that new generations have of their hopes of living and progressing in a society where justice does not work.
“Participación Ciudadana warns of the evident indicators that there is an attempt to frustrate the anti-corruption efforts that are being developed with broad popular support. This onslaught has several fronts, the sentences in the courts are only one, not to mention the slowness and even paralysis in the hearing of the cases, such as the Anti-Octopus which, despite charges were filed nine months ago, the preliminary hearing has not yet started. Added to this worrying panorama are the attacks on all the public agencies responsible for the prevention and prosecution of corruption, such as the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the Comptroller General’s Office, the Chamber of Accounts, the Ombudsman and the Public Procurement and Contracting Agency.
“We do not want any innocent person to be condemned, but neither do we want any guilty person to be absolved. The Public Prosecutor’s Office and the judiciary are called to play their historic role at a time when the country has placed its hopes in an independent, transparent and well-administered justice system.”
Read more in Spanish:
Participacion Ciudadana press release
14 September 2022